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This truthiness after the Colbert Reportis falsity manufactured and then consumedlike those fastfood promises of the good:McDo for a day's wage,Coke for an hour's sweatand not even enoughto make you mad, damn madto rip your Levi's 501 in twoto let your hungry fleshbe seen, exhibitedfor the traitors to seethe meaning of betrayal.

This truthinessby the Colbert Report is the same as exporting democracyin other people's dinner table,other civilizations wrought in other timesand temperand truthbut never your own,not an Americanot a Philippinenot a Britishnot any of the alliancesliving unto their own,us exiles toomimicking the regimeof truth in our freewaysnow our Hollywoodor the idiot of a televisiontelling us of the importanceof images without dark shadows us trying to find outthe nickname of meaning of our livesin better plots to reclaimthe substance of a nationin terms declared byits own dust panickingin whispersthe blood in the memoryreminding it to keep stillkeep the peacekeep the historythat matters in each hurried mealcitizens of the nationpartake, togetherand all, drink in the handand celebrating victoryin the way they definelife with a sense,like the sweet smellof fruits ripening in the gravesof their struggles.

Today, we impotent witnesses say:today is truthinesstold as it were:there are no illusions here,only the imaginationof the real.

So we watch as the truthunravels.

First in the democracy we share:the fullness of tablesas in the fullness of lives we liveminus the dictates of nations gifting us with gracebut then selling us their wares:democracy like coffee, blandand instant, with instant loveto taste.

Ha, forget the show:it is all for the consumptionof the elite, this masqueradewith no relief.

Colbert Report and all, we report:democracy is in the bread we break,the wine we drink of the same cup,in victory as in defeat.

Aurelio S. AgcaoiliDraft in Los Angeles,Draft in Honolulu,another final draft in Marikina,Easter Sunday, April 16, 2006

Setting: Hawaii, at a basi-drinking gathering. The present. Stage bare. Characters bring their own set.

Scene: (In a dream, 6 main characters in the 4 corners of the stage.)

Ghostly Chorus: (recited like a limerick, mocking, or can be set to a metallic rock music to create cacophonous sounds, jarring, confusing, clanging, but forceful and fierce. These could be done for all the ghostly chorus lines.)

You belongTo this brown land.You belong to us.Fil-Am, Fil-Am, Fil-Am.You belong to us.

The brown land is you;The brown land is yoursFilipino immigrantFil-Im, Fil-Im, Fil-Im

Flip 1I am Flip Number 1, local born. Born in the suburbs, west of here in this place, down where the river meets the sea. I grew up with the sounds of English and the crowing of chickens and the smell of basi, burger, and sushi.

Flip 2The Filipino words have been buried in me. I never heard them. I am Flip Number 2, Americanized, twang, mind, memory—all.

Fil-Im 1Born in the brown earth, with the memory of salt and despair. I am Filipino immigrant, Fil-Im number 1. I have cut my umbilical cord.

Fil-Im 2Born of poverty and want. Sorrow and joy. I am Filipino immigrant, Fil-Im number 2. I came to this Red Earth to scratch out a life. I have put an end to all connections.

Fil-Am 1I am Fil-Am number 1. I am found and I am lost. The Brown Earth of the forest leadsme to confusion.

Fil-Am 2I am Fil-Am number 2. Loneliness is everywhere in this Red Earth. I want to go back to my Brown Earth. But the Red Earth beckons me.

Fil-Am 1I dream of returning to the Brown Earth. That is what will save me from forgetting.My folks say you need to refuse being buried on the Red Earth.

Fil-Im 1Red Earth, the Brown Earth, are they ever us?

Fil-Im 2I dream of the Red Earth as a curse. First, it was welcoming ball of fire, fiery, and cold. It says, Welcome, welcome stranger. Dumanonka, dumanonka!

Fil-Im 1And then you got into this world. Like me. There was enchantment, was there?Isublidak idiay Filipinas! Have me back in the brown land where I came from!

Flip 1First it opened up into a world of milk and honey as the dream was. There was bounty. A paradise, fresh and clean, and rich, and unspoiled.

Fil-Im 2You get into the world of the Red Earth and never go back to yourself. You lost your direction, your senses, your sense of self. You spoke English. You spoke only English. And the Red Earth got bigger and bigger, and swallowed you up.

Fil-Im 1An omen. The Red Earth says I should only drink its waters, breathe only its air, live only on its produce, and taste only its soil, bowing only to it with reverence like a ritual, and vowing to love it like no other.

Fil-Im 2I do not want to go back to the Brown Earth. The memories haunt me so.

Fil-Im 1I cannot even dream of the good life there. The old country, the old country. I have no though of the shape of the good life. How does it look like, now, this good life?

Fil-Im 2Do they sell the good life in the streets the way they sell the votes? The leaders, the leaders of the old country. They can only act. Ah, Brown Earth.

Fil-Im 1I can only dream of snow and the wide spaces the malls.. this is my America. America is me now. This is my Red Earth. My Brown Earth is gone. I had it buried in my heart, my memory, my soul.

Fil-Im 2No trace. Not a trace of who I was.

Fil-Am 1I think of us all in this land as children of the Red Earth.. it is the land adopting us.

Fil-Im 2This land. This America whose air we breathe. This America giving us all the freedom that we thought we wanted. The America that creates magic out of our lips, the magic in English enchanting us.

Flip 1We all come from the Brown Earth. But here, in America, here do the colors ever collide? Do they ever come into a fusion?

Chorus 1 – Red EarthYou do not know.You can never know.Flip, flip, flipYou can never escapeThe big Brown Earth.

Flip 2I want to go away from the Brown Earth. I want to come to the Red Earth.

Fil-Im 1I do not even want to think about it. My dad wants me to talk American-English. No pidgin, he says. Gardemet, gardemet, he says.

Fil-Am 2My dad was a teacher in the grades back in the old country.

Fil-Im 1Your father came here and he washed dishes and taught himself how to pronounce fillet mignon, and Sorbonne, and Paris and buffet the French way.

Flip 1Oh, how your father flaunted his knowledge of the great America without the warts, the blemishes.

Flip 2Ahhh, dis is the greyt kawntri, he says.

Fil-Im 2Your English, no good, says the school principal, when Father applied to teach in the grade school. You will pollute the language of the children.

Fil-Am 1While he washed dishes, my father, he dreamt of his classroom in the grades, the school children with their eager faces, eager to get some skills so they can go abroad and earn dollars so the homeland would not go to the ways of the impoverished.

Flip 1It is the accent, man!

Fil-Am 1Bumperrr to bumperrr.

Fil-Im 1Krakerrr!

Fil-Am 2Rranglerrr!

Fil-Im 1Hamburdyer.

Flip 2Hear this, hear this.My politicized mother called the Philippines. There was a state of emergency down there, as the case everyday.. like Gloria Macapagal Arroyo saying: enough already ngarud. Enough na of rali-rali and the kudeta. State of emergency, state of calamity, state of war. Istet, mother says. Istet. Like the United Istet?

Ghostly chorus of the Red Earth perform a frenzied dance and move to center stage.

Scene 2

(Main characters carry their chairs to the center. Ghostly chorus becomes the table, pasts, and walls in what looks like a dap-ayan, a talking area in the purok. Main characters sit around the table with a bottle of basi at the center.)

Fil-Im 1memory binds us to the Brown Earth, to the homeland.

Fil-Im 2Memory links us to the Red Earth; the new land.

Flip 1I don’t have a desire to go back to the old country. I do not know it. It is not my country.I was born here.

Flip 1Never been to the homeland myself. I do not know anything. The Red Earth is my homeland. This America is my heartland.

Flip 2Homeland, heartland—they are one and the same. This is my Red Earth.

Fil-Am 2There is no point going back to the Brown Earth. You have not left it, right?

Fil-Am 1Our folks talk of going back all the time. Mom says, I do not want to die here. I want to be buried in that same Brown Earth I was born, she says. And she says that almost every week as if to remind us that we have an obligation to bring her home and bury her there.

Flip 1My grandparent tell us all the time, we don’t want to live in nursing homes. Bring us home, and they are in their home in Honolulu. What are they saying?

Fil-Am 2My grandfather says, I am American. The misshapen nose, the nostrils opening bigger than cherry tomatoes, allowing the air to freely come in and out. Oh, it is magic. The coming and going of air in his pug nose. And he says he is an American the way John Kerry says he is. No heritage, just American, plain American. We challenge him and he runs to get his passport from the drawer and shows it to us. Dis, dis, dis! Dis makes me American! Many would die to get dis!

Flip 2Are we lost?

Flip 1Do we know who we are?

Fil-Im 2Who are we?

Fil-Am 1 / Fil-Am 2We are lost.

Flip 1 / Flip 2We can be found again.

Chorus – Red EarthSome more denying.Some more depriving.Some more unknowing.

(Main characters put rice an salt on their bowls, and ready for the rice throwing ceremony. Choruses become a table, post, and walls again, not moving.)

Fil-Im 2We call the spirits of the Brown Earth.

Flip 1The spirits of the Brown Earth; the spirits of the Red Earth.

Fil-Im 1My grandmother says, Go away, go away. Go away you spirits of the rotten earth, you spirits of the spoiled earth, you spirits of the decayed earth. Come, come you spirits of the good earth, the Brown Earth, the Red Earth, the earth that blesses us, the one that gives us life. Come she says, and she dances, blood dripping in circles the front of our house, all over the ground.

Flip 1My grandpa when I got sick one day got rice and salt. Mixed them on a coconut bowl. (Brings out one from pocket. Puts in rice and salt and throws it on stage and to the audiences.) he went outside, in the dark and recited: umadayokayo, Apo. Umadayokayo. Baribari, Apo, baribari.

Ghostly chorus, in a danceFlips, flips, flips.Coming home to themselves.Fil-Ams, Fil-Ams, Fil-Ams.Coming back to their sensesImmigrants, immigrantsGoing back their earths.

Fil-Am / Fil-Im / FlipsComing home to the Brown Earth.Coming home to the Red Earth.

For the spirits of the Brown Earth, for the spirits of the Red Earth.

(Main characters move to the center, pour out basi on their bowls and ritually pour out basi on the Red Earth, and the Brown Earth who are now slumped on the stage.)

For the spirits of the Brown Earth, for the spirits of the Red Earth. We see them coming together, these spirits, happy, and proud and contented. In our maniness, we are one. (Before they sip, )Bagiyo, bagiyo, apo.Kukuayo Apo.

CURTAINS FALL.

Written for the April 2006 College Summit, University of Hawaii. The author thanks Prof. Precy Espiritu, play director, for the revisions. Written in Waipahu, Hawaii, in February 2006 during my visiting lecturership at the UH; revisions were done in March 2006.

it is the game we playto temp fate, the goodkind, we who dream of better seasonsof better climeseven when the coldwinds kick in, the strong onesto muzzle us into not believing the giftthe numbers offer,the five numbers to make us hope again,the mega numberto make us seethe promise of possibilities like the way the oldestof the three men imaginingthe winnings seeing houses and carsfor the two younger onesdreaming of a grand vacation for them threeto rest the tired bones,tired from carrying all the burdensof the memory of lossand wanting for something more to keep hanging onin life as in love.

we do it the quick pickway, make it a lump sumall the time to sharethe taxes with those who had hoped with you a long time ago,those who divined the starsand from there see the light of moon shadowssome vision perhaps,some sense of samenessin the game we playduring the storm seasonsof our wild wild dreamsin this city and countrywe have come to to findself and sorrowmoney and magicdestiny and desire.

so we play with the numbers, ala pot luck.we put in all our last dollars, put them together in prayer and in this nightof our abandonedimaginings,we see numbers determining the reign of kings,of thieves,of cheats,and kindness.

Saturdays are hereto make us sit downand take stockof what we have got.

Few dollars for the $120 millionmegalottoto make hope alivespringing eternallike the wild flowers of the Los Angeles mountainsgoing wild.

Mondays till Fridaysare the defects of virtuegoing sweet and then going sourlike some cheap milkwe stock up for the promise of nutrients and fullnesswhen a meal is obligatoryand swallowing food takenalone makes you cry brooksbecoming seas of the broken exile's heart.

Ha, Saturdays make yousit down and write poemswrite the nation of exilesthe nation that harbors ill-feelingsbecause you do not send the dollarsto buy the elites the bulletsto hit the enemy like us.

We have seen it this wayfor a long long timeand we have not spoken the wordthe liberating wordthat tells uswho we really are.

Exiles, remitters of falsecourage and pretensesof those we vote to governour tarnished lives.

The nation of exiles,this is the one we have gotthe only one we havethe only one we write.

Saturdays are hereto make us sit downand take stockof what we have got.

Few dollars for the $120 millionmegalottoto make hope alivespringing eternallike the wild flowers of the Los Angeles mountainsgoing wild.

Mondays till Fridaysare the defects of virtuegoing sweet and then going sourlike some cheap milkwe stock up for the promise of nutrients and fullnesswhen a meal is obligatoryand swallowing food takenalone makes you cry brooksbecoming seas of the broken exile's heart.

Ha, Saturdays make yousit down and write poemswrite the nation of exilesthe nation that harbors ill-feelingsbecause you do not send the dollarsto buy the elites the bulletsto hit the enemy like us.

We have seen it this wayfor a long long timeand we have not spoken the wordthe liberating wordthat tells uswho we really are.

Exiles, remitters of falsecourage and pretensesof those we vote to governour tarnished lives.

The nation of exiles,this is the one we have gotthe only one we havethe only one we write.

Theirs is a conspiracy of good children trying to make art. Or produce one.

One is a graphic artist her hands full of colorsshadeslines shapes nuances metaphorseven as she hates her canvassof a jaw she gets from you.Malapad ang panga,ipinama mo, she taunts youin mid-laughtersthe beginnings you do not know.

The other is a sonmaking remarkson what happens to the poorwhen they look to that televisionshow for a relief a redemptionin quick steps death includedabout seventy of them or sofinding life somehowin the dream of the Pinoy universethat knows the meaning of justiceon tables, beds, homesof political assholesof religious smart-alecksof soldiery putschists like those who can mouthsome saving gracesfor the electwho have known for so longthe route to betrayalwe can only imaginein the gruel of the poorgetting more watery each mealuntil the whole bowlis one of plain waterthat cleans up the dirt in the gut.

We are poor people,us who dream of poems' titlesthe children liking povertyfor its poetic sense.

The children and I,we create a caricatureof fairness from wordsfrom phrases from sentencesfrom idioms we can live bydespite the hunger and the griefthat go with the starry nights we spend remembering each others' words,we who have to spell sacrificein terms of days, weeks, months lostbetween us, anniversaries too and christmasses,the precious years becoming plain absences, again and again,until we remember we have a duty to write more poems,our conspiratorial actto sacrilege and blessingsbecause we have to bowto the forces that can freeus finally from this bad faith, finally from this bad fate.

Grace will come to rescue usin each line that we writeto reinvent ourselves,poets of life livedin the spirits of meaningswe create, multiple and renewing,saving and salving.

Theirs is a conspiracy of good children trying to make art. Or produce one.

One is a graphic artist her hands full of colorsshadeslines shapes nuances metaphorseven as she hates her canvassof a jaw she gets from you.Malapad ang panga,ipinama mo, she taunts youin mid-laughtersthe beginnings you do not know.

The other is a sonmaking remarkson what happens to the poorwhen they look to that televisionshow for a relief a redemptionin quick steps death includedabout seventy of them or sofinding life somehowin the dream of the Pinoy universethat knows the meaning of justiceon tables, beds, homesof political assholesof religious smart-alecksof soldiery putschists like those who can mouthsome saving gracesfor the electwho have known for so longthe route to betrayalwe can only imaginein the gruel of the poorgetting more watery each mealuntil the whole bowlis one of plain waterthat cleans up the dirt in the gut.

We are poor people,us who dream of poems' titlesthe children liking povertyfor its poetic sense.

The children and I,we create a caricatureof fairness from wordsfrom phrases from sentencesfrom idioms we can live bydespite the hunger and the griefthat go with the starry nights we spend remembering each others' words,we who have to spell sacrificein terms of days, weeks, months lostbetween us, anniversaries too and christmasses,the precious years becoming plain absences, again and again,until we remember we have a duty to write more poems,our conspiratorial actto sacrilege and blessingsbecause we have to bowto the forces that can freeus finally from this bad faith, finally from this bad fate.

Grace will come to rescue usin each line that we writeto reinvent ourselves,poets of life livedin the spirits of meaningswe create, multiple and renewing,saving and salving.

In the face of what is happening to the home country of the Filipino immigrants and Filipino Americans, the victory of the Pacman against a formidable opponent is a metaphor of some sorts.

Manny Pacquiao’s TKO is a trope of a national redemption we Filipinos need so bad.

Manny Pacquiao is a trope of a commitment to a homeland.

Manny Pacquiao is a trope of a conviction to honor the land of our hopes, we who have gone away in order to scratch out a life in strange and unfamiliar places all over the world.

We do not buy the blood and gore that goes with fighting it out in order to make sense out of the nonsense that goes with governance gone haywire in the homeland.

We do not buy the pugilist’s destructive intent in his quest for the gold and the glory.

There is violence in the intent even as there is violence in the means to pursue that intent.

There is violence as well in the venue for the pursuit to come about despite the applause of spectators, despite the glee, despite the calculated boisterousness for every hit each pugilist would strike on the head or the body of the opponent.

The spectators, of course, are there to witness the drama of self-destruction and the drama of destroying the other, with each act highlighting conquest, failure, more blood, more struggle.

The spectators—numbed by the scenes of each major act in a twelve act play that commenced with the singing of three anthems, one for the Pacman homeland, the other for Eric Morales’ Mexico, and the last for the Union’s “land of the brave” and “land of the free” —certainly paid with their precious dollars to get a ringside view of the spectacle we call the redemption of a decayed and destroyed Filipino pride.

We count some big shots from the home country.

One is a first gentleman who is a resident of the Palace of Power.

Another one is a gentleman whose revelations were the seed of the destruction of the Reign of Power of a President of the Land, with that President eventually disgraced by a People Power but with the Land remaining in anguish and sorrow and hopeful of better days ahead.

This is how we put in context the Pacman Passover to another triumph of the spirit.

His was a gentle dream: “My fight is for you—this fight is for you.”

Sang, chanted, recited, declaimed, the fighting words ring true of all immigrants in the United States and elsewhere—all immigrants whose desires for home and homeland have been exiled by the exigencies of everyday life.

The fighting words are a mantra as well.

They get to the bottom of things.

They are at the heart of exile, diaspora, overseas life, immigrant life, life in the margin, life away from home.

With this victory, perhaps something good may come out of it.

One lesson learned: there is the urgent and immediate need to fight it out—to be bold and daring, to be strong and focused, to be committed and dedicated.

One need not lecture the migrant and the immigrant. They are the better students and teachers of a life lived outside the homeland.

Pacquiao the Pacman will go home to an adoring crowd.

He will be presented as a trophy. And we praise him for the honor he has brought upon all of us, upon our land.

But not all migrants and immigrants are as lucky even if all the days of their lives they have also fought it out in not so kind countries and climes.

In the face of what is happening to the home country of the Filipino immigrants and Filipino Americans, the victory of the Pacman against a formidable opponent is a metaphor of some sorts.

Manny Pacquiao’s TKO is a trope of a national redemption we Filipinos need so bad.

Manny Pacquiao is a trope of a commitment to a homeland.

Manny Pacquiao is a trope of a conviction to honor the land of our hopes, we who have gone away in order to scratch out a life in strange and unfamiliar places all over the world.

We do not buy the blood and gore that goes with fighting it out in order to make sense out of the nonsense that goes with governance gone haywire in the homeland.

We do not buy the pugilist’s destructive intent in his quest for the gold and the glory.

There is violence in the intent even as there is violence in the means to pursue that intent.

There is violence as well in the venue for the pursuit to come about despite the applause of spectators, despite the glee, despite the calculated boisterousness for every hit each pugilist would strike on the head or the body of the opponent.

The spectators, of course, are there to witness the drama of self-destruction and the drama of destroying the other, with each act highlighting conquest, failure, more blood, more struggle.

The spectators—numbed by the scenes of each major act in a twelve act play that commenced with the singing of three anthems, one for the Pacman homeland, the other for Eric Morales’ Mexico, and the last for the Union’s “land of the brave” and “land of the free” —certainly paid with their precious dollars to get a ringside view of the spectacle we call the redemption of a decayed and destroyed Filipino pride.

We count some big shots from the home country.

One is a first gentleman who is a resident of the Palace of Power.

Another one is a gentleman whose revelations were the seed of the destruction of the Reign of Power of a President of the Land, with that President eventually disgraced by a People Power but with the Land remaining in anguish and sorrow and hopeful of better days ahead.

This is how we put in context the Pacman Passover to another triumph of the spirit.

His was a gentle dream: “My fight is for you—this fight is for you.”

Sang, chanted, recited, declaimed, the fighting words ring true of all immigrants in the United States and elsewhere—all immigrants whose desires for home and homeland have been exiled by the exigencies of everyday life.

The fighting words are a mantra as well.

They get to the bottom of things.

They are at the heart of exile, diaspora, overseas life, immigrant life, life in the margin, life away from home.

With this victory, perhaps something good may come out of it.

One lesson learned: there is the urgent and immediate need to fight it out—to be bold and daring, to be strong and focused, to be committed and dedicated.

One need not lecture the migrant and the immigrant. They are the better students and teachers of a life lived outside the homeland.

Pacquiao the Pacman will go home to an adoring crowd.

He will be presented as a trophy. And we praise him for the honor he has brought upon all of us, upon our land.

But not all migrants and immigrants are as lucky even if all the days of their lives they have also fought it out in not so kind countries and climes.

(For Nasudi Francine, b/c she asks questions why I have stayed away from home for so long)

Sundays remind me of chill and rainand your story about your pain,dear daughter, caring child,resilient recipient of residual lovessome kind of a sweet surrenderfrom a parent who calls you on the phoneto declare his presencebut is alwaysabsentin the cold of morningsin the warmth of eveningsin the affirming powerof distances.

The parent you missdoes not comewith the brilliant sun before it setsas your mother doesor as you ask your motherfor her to come homebefore night fallson our doorwhere I used to come ininto your huge smileinto your wide embraceinto your baby laughter.He promises you bribes,the father in a faraway placewhere dreams are aplentyand your missing eachother is real his bribesyou do not understand:Barbie, Dora,crayons the colorof the rainbow after the drizzle announcingsome singingor chocolates he buysfrom stores he goes to vend his private sorrow,leave it there in the stacks of sweets to mix with bitternessand the promise of gracein the wrappings of giftsin the ribbons of boxesto hide the telltale tears,permanent residentsof his heavy heart.

It is always like this,dear daughter, caring child,it is always like thisfor all parents leaving the land a dictatorcreated out of conjugal capriceto find some signs of livingin some place somewhere else.

You have asked me what I do herein the land of migrantsin the land of familiar estrangementsin the land of small and big inequities you do not see.

I tell you: I work each day, 24/7 I dream each week,7/4 I write poems each month, 4/12 to make us live to help the country live a life to redeem ourselves from this indenture in decadesfrom this wretchedness of our witsfrom this penury of our broken spiritsfrom this deprivation of our captive mindstwins all, doubles to our lovingour peopleto our loving our land.

Ah, parents go away this time around.

We all do.Mothers missing a child's first word.Fathers not hearinga child's night prayeron her bed.

There is nowhereelse to go but to leave the heartland to live with a generous heart.But we will all come homeat the appointed timespring or no springwinter or no wintersummer or no summerfall or no fall.

We will come home to roostand remember all the lovingand remember all the days we lostand remember all the child's painswe missed healing.

It is Sunday here againand the cold in this tailend of winter gets into the bones.I remember your singingin the rain, and merrily so,and your asking meif in this strange landthe rain comes to whipmy window the wayit does in your room's.

I said, yes, rainscome into my room even on Sundays like nowand they wash awaymy window panewhere I always see you cavorting with your angels.

We are unfortunate because we are strangers to good luckits logic of lossas flawed as extending our mealwith a bowl of ricea pinch of salt a phrase of a prayer to taste a bowl of rice with father'soracion to create the magicof fulness, asin, asin, makalulukmeg iti pingping.

We eat with gusto, with the picture of tomorrow in the headspinning and spinningfor the good days to come about on the tablein the kitchenin the pocket.

It is not the same here now,not in this strange land.Like us, our dreamsare on exile. This is the land that gives birthto our stangeness to news back home and to all homes wreakedby exported wars and democracy,even as each morning we feed on hope and more hopes.

It is cold down herein morningsas the snow remind us of spring comingand soon.The flowers will bloomand hide the destruction in other landsthe fears in other people's heartsbut not here where illusionis real, where the pictureof progress is perfectfor ranchers becoming leadersand hunters becoming leadersand old wealth becoming older and olderas the power of thievesget entrenched and entrenched.It is the same storyin the land we come from.It does not end.It begins and begins again.

We are unfortunate because we are strangers to good luckits logic of lossas flawed as extending our mealwith a bowl of ricea pinch of salt a phrase of a prayer to taste a bowl of rice with father'soracion to create the magicof fulness, asin, asin, makalulukmeg iti pingping.

We eat with gusto, with the picture of tomorrow in the headspinning and spinningfor the good days to come about on the tablein the kitchenin the pocket.

It is not the same here now,not in this strange land.Like us, our dreamsare on exile. This is the land that gives birthto our stangeness to news back home and to all homes wreakedby exported wars and democracy,even as each morning we feed on hope and more hopes.

It is cold down herein morningsas the snow remind us of spring comingand soon.The flowers will bloomand hide the destruction in other landsthe fears in other people's heartsbut not here where illusionis real, where the pictureof progress is perfectfor ranchers becoming leadersand hunters becoming leadersand old wealth becoming older and olderas the power of thievesget entrenched and entrenched.It is the same storyin the land we come from.It does not end.It begins and begins again.

What jolt us at this time are the seemingly incongruous events shocking us even from afar.

These events are the spectacle of poverty being exploited on national television by the Wowowee show where the stories of despair become fodder for public consumption of what it means to be dirt poor.

We hear their stories, the poor who went to that show to stake their claim to the good fortune made possible by the gods and the goodness of heart of the host who knew when to spot the authentically poor from the authentically impoverished.

The deaths were a sad commentary of what have we become as a people.

Desperate.

And dedicated to despair.

And now this at St. Bernard in Leyte.

The mud is what seals the spectacle of death. Acres and acres of mud that make final what death is all about.

We put in the eerie sub-stories of a text message of someone trapped there and asking that they be helped, the plea ultimate and primal: “Please, help us, ma’am.”

We come full circle with all these narratives of despair.

We see—again and again—the see of people trying to get into the scene of celebration and death for that anniversary show dedicated to the proposition that if the government remains callous to the plight of the downtrodden, then let us, at least, make a show out of this misery so that those balikbayans coming over would be moved to shell out something, something extra, a surplus from their hotel bills and from their dollar-determined life in the US of A.

A thousand pesos is a thousand pesos wherever one goes.

The thousand pesos that one gets as a consolation prize translates to five days of hard work if you were subcontracting your labor to the retail chains that do not consider the meaning of human labor except to count the monies that come into the company’s coffers out of the sweat and blood of degreed young men and women people whose duty is to put back the clothing and the shoes on the rack after customers have tried them on or simply inspected them for appropriate color combination with their skin tone.

These spectacle of tragedy continues to haunt the country and the despair comes from the thought that there seems to be an end to all of these.

One tragedy after another is simply too much for a country that does not have enough resources except its people that go away in order to find life somewhere else.

One news account says that many of the fathers in this community in Leyte were away at the time of the landslide—away in other countries scratching out a life for their families and children, many of them perhaps trapped in the school building that seemed to have been swallowed up in one instant by the rampaging mud.

Many questions remain: how did it happen that a landslide of this magnitude could wipe out a community?

Are there environmental issues involved here?

Who is in-charge?

Even in this tragedy, we see a repeat of what capability we have.

We have to depend on some other people and some other countries for the basic instruments needed to determine whether there is indeed some life still trapped under mud.

We call for a wake up call—but then when was the last time ever that we were able awakened by these realities?

What jolt us at this time are the seemingly incongruous events shocking us even from afar.

These events are the spectacle of poverty being exploited on national television by the Wowowee show where the stories of despair become fodder for public consumption of what it means to be dirt poor.

We hear their stories, the poor who went to that show to stake their claim to the good fortune made possible by the gods and the goodness of heart of the host who knew when to spot the authentically poor from the authentically impoverished.

The deaths were a sad commentary of what have we become as a people.

Desperate.

And dedicated to despair.

And now this at St. Bernard in Leyte.

The mud is what seals the spectacle of death. Acres and acres of mud that make final what death is all about.

We put in the eerie sub-stories of a text message of someone trapped there and asking that they be helped, the plea ultimate and primal: “Please, help us, ma’am.”

We come full circle with all these narratives of despair.

We see—again and again—the see of people trying to get into the scene of celebration and death for that anniversary show dedicated to the proposition that if the government remains callous to the plight of the downtrodden, then let us, at least, make a show out of this misery so that those balikbayans coming over would be moved to shell out something, something extra, a surplus from their hotel bills and from their dollar-determined life in the US of A.

A thousand pesos is a thousand pesos wherever one goes.

The thousand pesos that one gets as a consolation prize translates to five days of hard work if you were subcontracting your labor to the retail chains that do not consider the meaning of human labor except to count the monies that come into the company’s coffers out of the sweat and blood of degreed young men and women people whose duty is to put back the clothing and the shoes on the rack after customers have tried them on or simply inspected them for appropriate color combination with their skin tone.

These spectacle of tragedy continues to haunt the country and the despair comes from the thought that there seems to be an end to all of these.

One tragedy after another is simply too much for a country that does not have enough resources except its people that go away in order to find life somewhere else.

One news account says that many of the fathers in this community in Leyte were away at the time of the landslide—away in other countries scratching out a life for their families and children, many of them perhaps trapped in the school building that seemed to have been swallowed up in one instant by the rampaging mud.

Many questions remain: how did it happen that a landslide of this magnitude could wipe out a community?

Are there environmental issues involved here?

Who is in-charge?

Even in this tragedy, we see a repeat of what capability we have.

We have to depend on some other people and some other countries for the basic instruments needed to determine whether there is indeed some life still trapped under mud.

We call for a wake up call—but then when was the last time ever that we were able awakened by these realities?